


A Little Because

by Leni



Category: Dollhouse
Genre: Episode: s02e12 The Hollow Men, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-29
Updated: 2011-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-28 10:58:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/307157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leni/pseuds/Leni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ivy, post <span class="u">Hollow Men</span>. <i>I'm tired of whys, choking on whys, just need a little because</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Because

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Prismatic](http://staringiscaring.livejournal.com/76815.html).

The world doesn’t end in a whisper. That would be too obvious, too cliché… too unlike Topher.

But Topher is unlike Topher, too. She tries to remember the proud geek, the self-appointed god of their reality, but each and every time, she sees the terrified kid holding onto her and sending her away. In her memory, he will always be guilty and wronged, the lord of a manor going up in flames. He was overflowing with feelings where he’d never shown any, and Ivy has never been more scared as when he looked her in the eye and called her smart, the smartest. Because _Topher_ is the smartest one and, _what have they done?_

Why did they do it at all?

*

Her mother calls two days after she races out of the underground. A rat running from the maze, Ivy thinks, and starts crying as she deletes every evidence of her own research from her computer.

“Your father says you’re moving back.” There’s that stern tone, the reason she bore with carting around bags of candy and fruity drinks. Not the darkest shades of moral code and the whims of her immediate boss could have made her return home in disgrace.

“Yes, mother.” Rossum is still at the head of its field; all smiles on TV and magazines, and taking enough breaks from the publicity to hunt down the remnants of the L.A. Dollhouse. “Just for a couple of weeks, I promise.” Can’t lead Rossum to her parents, but they won’t think she’d choose her childhood home as her first refuge. She’ll outsmart them, then. That’s the plan.

“But, Ivy…. What about your job?”

 _My boss’s last order was to run._ “Vacation. I’ve been saving downtime.” _For once, I listened to him._

“…Are you pregnant?”

“What? No!”

“Because your boss called, said that it didn’t matter. That they understood it wasn’t your fault, and they appreciated the work you’d done for the company.”

Topher’s last communication was the day before, an encrypted e-mail before he and Ms. Dewitt went to ground: ‘ _Disappear_.’ Funny. Forty-eight hours ago, the mention of anyone respecting her work would have her grinning in self-satisfaction and looking for loopholes in her contract to quit working under Topher and moving on to greener pastures.

It is terrifying that, in the Dollhouse, Topher was the greenest of them all.

“Mother, please.” Her hand is gripping the phone. She doesn’t want to disappear, not like the others will be forced to. _please, please, please_. She did nothing. _Why can’t they leave me alone?_ She did nothing – perhaps that’s why. “I promise, I’ll explain when I get home.”

*

Ivy walks out of the airport, pulling her luggage behind her and feeling naked without her Blackberry and a laptop under her arm.

“Ives!”

At that voice, she grins. She recognizes the car, too, and hopes that her father won’t give in to her mother and trade it for a newer model. “Dad!”

“Ivy, my dear!” The passenger door opens, and her mother breezes out toward her. “I’m so glad you came, sweetie. I’ve missed you so much! Come, come,” she waves Ivy over, “You have to _see_ what I did to your room!”

Her father has an amused smile, as if he doesn’t know what happened either but is game for his wife’s improved mood. “She left yesterday for her spa treatment,” he whispers once he’s at her side, taking the luggage handle from her, “she’s been excited about your return ever since.”

Her parents live three hours away from the closest functioning Dollhouse. Thirty minutes in helicopter – tops. Ivy closes her fists and looks up, watching wistfully as a plane cuts through the blue skies and zooms out of view.

For her, there will be no such escape.

“She came home late, didn’t she?” Ivy asks her dad, a teary knot in her throat even before he nods. She follows him to the car anyway. Where else would she go? Why go anywhere else?

Her mother is chattering in the background.

The engine starts; her father looks at her in the rearview mirror. Frowns when he catches sight of her face. “Ives?”

Her mother turns up the radio volume. Clyde Clive is eagerly telling his interviewer about the latest breakthrough in Rossum technology.

“Ives?” her father presses. “You okay?”

Ivy puts a hand on her mother’s shoulder, and when she is welcomed with a sunny smile, she understands a little how Topher felt when Bennett was shot. “I’m sorry,” she tells the woman – her _mother_ , a part of her wails; but of all people, she knows better. “I’m _so_ sorry.”

The woman’s face softens. “Why, honey?”

Because….

*

The world doesn’t end in a whisper.

 _Because we were too smart._

 _Because we weren’t smart enough._

 _Because_ I _wasn’t smart enough._

The world ends in a question.

Ivy forgets the plan to keep moving, settles into the bedroom her father’s wife has redecorated, and waits.

If she ever finds an answer, the masked man pointing a remote wiper doesn’t care.

 

The End  
30/01/11


End file.
